Table of Contents
Table of Contents1
What is a Vision?2
September Manifesto3
Case Study: Big City University4
Appendices
Traditional Planning Process6
What is a Vision?
At the forefront of any effective planning process is a vision; the vision is the heart of the planning process, where the planning is directed.
A vision always answers two questions:
Where does the group want to be?
What does the group want to be like?
A vision can be described in different ways:
The art of seeing things invisible.
The magnetic North for an organization.
An animated view of the future.
An idea that’s part foresight and part insight.
A picture that jump-starts the future.
A product of the head and heart working together.
A force in people’s hearts, a force of impressive power.
A powerful vision is a compelling, bold, and transforming future for the organization.
Key dynamics of a powerful vision:
Desirable future: articulates compelling possibilities.
Stretch: demonstrates a healthy disregard for the impossible.
Contribution & benefit to the world: a focus that makes a difference to society.
Based on aspirations vs. fear: what do we want, not what do we need to avoid.
Commitment from the heart: personally compelling and meaningful.
September Manifesto
Santa Cruz Student Housing
On September 23, 1996, at the Cesar Chavez Cooperative in Santa Cruz, student co-op members met with Phil Ashton of the North American Students of Cooperation, to create a vision for the coming year. We discussed some of the problems and solutions we saw in the world, created a visual map of our organization and the issues surrounding it, and collectively wrote the following statement. The experience was memorable for all involved.
We, the members of the Santa Cruz Student Housing Co-ops, hereby join together to confront:
Local and national student housing crisis, which makes housing more expensive and limits accessibility to college education.
Growing isolation and destruction of community in America and throughout the world.
Rampant and ignorant consumerism, which creates waste and perpetuates an unjust economic system.
Fragmentation and destruction of modern society and the loss of connection to the earth and to other people.
We will address these profound problems by reinforcing:
Love for ourselves and for others.
Democratic organization and economics.
An understanding to our connection to the web of life.
Social and personal responsibility.
Affordable, quality student housing.
Sharing, giving, and acceptance.
Diversity and an equalization of power.
An understanding of the whole as opposed to the parts.
These profound words will guide us and inspire us throughout the coming year. We recognize, though, that such a vision, as it comes from the members of our organization, will change as the membership grows, learns, and becomes anew.
Case Study
Big City University, Big City, Canada
Community
Big City is a large urban center with 3 universities, and a student population of about 100,000. All three universities are located in the downtown area. Big City itself is a major financial center, with large corporations, banks, and other financial institutions dominating the skyline with their skyscrapers. It is also the provincial capital, and many of the government agencies have their headquarters in the central part of the city. Because of the economic and political status of Big City, it has been able to support a vibrant art and cultural scene.
Despite the wealth and power of Big City, it is a very polarized town. Unemployment has remained high (13%) throughout the economic boom of the 1990s, and the rate is probably much higher among those more vulnerable to economic restructuring – recent immigrants, youth, single mothers. In recent years, Big City has been preferred as a home for recent immigrants; by the year 2005, it is anticipated that new arrivals will be the majority in the city. Housing conditions in certain parts of the city reflect this polarization; some of the neighborhoods farther out of downtown have seen intense tenant and squatters struggles.
Campus Politics
Big City students have a long tradition of activism. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, student leaders spearheaded a student coalition protesting province-wide tuition increases. These increases would make it much for people of low- and moderate-income backgrounds harder to afford a college education. While the increases were passed, the work of Big City students in the coalition has solidified their place in campus politics.
There are a number of student organizations working on campus, including groups working on issues such as: economic democracy, environmental justice, and civil rights. For the past two years, student council has been run by an activist slate, which has favored increasing services to help disadvantaged students afford higher education.
However, the University administration and the Board of Regents is notoriously conservative. They are extremely secretive and have been in a pitched battle with successive student councils, effectively thwarting many of the programs student have adopted.
The University’s endowment is invested heavily in real estate in the neighborhood surrounding campus. Many feel that they are seeking to benefit from the gentrification that has begun there, as witnessed by the proliferation of fancy restaurants and department stores, as opposed to laundromats and cafes that used to serve residents.
Student Life
Most students live in dorms for their first year at BCU, and the University has adopted a Campus Plan that commits them to providing housing for every incoming first-year student. After their first year, many students live off-campus in the surrounding neighborhoods (if they can afford them), but also in the working class neighborhoods on the fringes of the central city. Despite the progressive nature of student politics, there isn’t really a strong cultural or social life on campus.
The student council has committed itself to increasing the social life on campus, however, they have been criticized by women’s organizations on campus for focusing too much on parties and social life, and not following through on plans for student child care, for instance.
There are two newspapers on campus. The Tribune is run mainly by business and engineering students, and has a tradition of support for the administration and regularly criticizes the “bleeding hearts” that it sees running student government. The Daily, on the other hand, is a more progressive voice, focusing on municipal political issues as well as campus cultural issues.
Appendix A:
North American Students of Cooperation
PO Box 7715 Ann Arbor, MI, 48107 734.663.0889 fax 734.663.5072
Page 1